Soul Lag
by M to the Ichiyo
Summary: Subaru thinks he is a victim of jet lag, but when awake long enough, one starts to wonder...


  
**Disclaimer:** X does not belong to me. Yes yes, that's very sad. The onmyouji do not belong to be either and that emotion is best described with this face: T-T I have to pay for college here soon so I don't need to be sued.  
**Warnings:** Uhh... just a sprinkling of shounen-ai.  
**A/N:** Right, so this came to me a long while back, after I finished reading the novel briefly mentioned in this (further details at the end) and I think it makes for a interesting ficlet/drabble. And I really guessed on the riding in cars bit shrug Eh. Sorry if I'm wrong or close but obviously off XD Deal. 

**Soul Lag**

**------------**

Onmyouji do not like to ride in cars. It's a rule that Subaru has held true to, even though most of his ideals lay shattered at his feet. While in a car, an onmyouji is cut off from the spirits they interact with, as spirits didn't like cars.

Naturally, onmyouji don't like to ride in airplanes as well.

Subaru found it hard to work around the few times when his job required him to travel by plane, but he avoided it whenever he could. He hadn't been so lucky this time, however, much to his dismay, but he toughed it out because a job was a job, and he had nothing else better to do. Flying was tiresome and a hassle. Subaru didn't like to be shoved into a metal tube traveling at high speeds with strangers, save for the subway. Then there was the whole unable to project and the blockage of spirts issue to take into account.

He wondered if the reason for his dislike was due to the obstruction of his abilities or the resulting jet lag.

As he laid there, numb, in the darkness of his bedroom--darkness being an odd way to describe it as the eternal twilight of Tokyo seeped in through his messily drawn curtains and forced the room into hues of murky blue-- Subaru counted the imperfections in his ceiling, unable to sleep. He was stuck in those endless yet short-lived hours of the morning, wide awake and tired. His sleep patterns, though nearly nonexistent, were disrupted by the trip, and he found that for once he was slightly annoyed to be awake and restless.

He had read an interesting theory in a novel once(1), about the soul and the real reason behind jet lag and the disconnected feeling that he felt for sure he was experiencing. The book had said that one's soul was left behind, cut off from the body by the quick change of location due to travel by plane. Souls can't move that quickly apparently (and Subaru guessed that was why they wondered the Earth years after their death, but then again he was just playing along) and are left to dangle behind their owners, attached with a phantom umbilical cord to be reeled in and claimed later.

Subaru wasn't sure if he believed that jet lag was actually a side effect from his soul being disconnected from his body, but then again, he talked to lost souls nearly every day in some way, shape, or form, so who knew? Maybe it was possible.

But that made him wonder further about what that meant, the loss of one's soul momentarily. Did that excuse him from knowing the difference between right and wrong? Could he perhaps do things he normally wouldn't do and not get blamed for it? Subaru wasn't sure who would be doing the blaming for whatever reason, but he found that he liked that excuse a lot.

He could just imagine his soul wafting through the air in an imitation of the coil of cigarette smoke that was currently twisting its way slowly to the ceiling, and he hoped his soul was taking that same snail's pace to get back to him. He didn't need it now.

The bed shifted, the springs in his mattress creaking faintly as weight was added to places where weight hadn't been before. The trail of smoke faded away and Subaru turned his head to the side and watched the muscles of Seishirou's back move under his skin as he stretched an arm out to the bedside table, putting out the last of his cigarette. When the older man settled back, he caught his eyes, and Subaru wondered if he had actually seen a little bit of surprise in that mismatched stare.

"You should be sleeping, Subaru-kun," Seishirou informed him, a small amused smile playing about his lips.

"There's a lot of things I should be doing," Subaru murmured, sighing almost tiredly, disregarding the Sakurazukamori's fake attempt at seeming even the least bit concerned. He rolled onto his side, now facing Seishirou, a small part of his mind wondering what the man would think about him not having a soul at this very moment, and if he were to kill him now, his poor tree would be disappointed. "And there's also a lot of things I shouldn't be doing..." He added as an afterthought, a personal aside said out loud, closing his eyes and suddenly feeling tired.

He heard Seishirou chuckle at that and soon felt fingers brush through his hair, the touch gentle and odd, but Subaru found himself inching closer, pressing a bit too happily into the caress. Seishirou noticed but opted to not say anything, which Subaru was immensely grateful for, and continued with the touches, to which Subaru didn't even protest to as they drifted down the side of his face.

Thinking about how wrong it was for him to be sharing a bed with the harbinger of all the bad things in his life usually made his head and heart hurt; it tore him between self-loathing and despair. He should have known better, he always told himself that; a moment's high wasn't worth years of torment. Then again, if the theory about his soul was true, how was he to tell the difference between right and wrong?

It wasn't always that Subaru had the distinct pleasure of traveling by plane, and he made a mental note to himself to try it more often.

Owari  
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1)The novel is _Pattern Recognition_ by William Gibson. You should read the book if you like sci fi... the author likes to squeeze Japan into his stories a lot too so ;D

A nice review or two would be swell as this is the first time in forever that I've posted something on (last one was before the Great NC-17 ban of so many years ago)


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